Who is older in the Balkans, Greeks or Illyrians?

Albanians claim they are the oldest people living in the Balkans, and that everyone else, including the Ancient Greeks, came after them. In fact, the Albanians even go as for as to claim they are Pelasgians! Here is the reality:

*THE ILLYRIANS:

"The Illyrians were Indo-European tribesmen who appeared in the western part of the Balkan Peninsula about 1000 BC."

(Tara Bahl, M.H. Syed, Encyclopaedia of the Muslim World, p40)

"From about 800 B.C., in the east and west of Macedonia, including Pelagonia and Eordaea, new people appeared. These people were likely to have been Illyrians who came from what was recently central Yugoslavia, an area that had acted as a reservoir of Illyrian peoples. There was a great expansion of the Illyrians, south to Thessaly, east to the middle Vardar valley, to places that were the forerunners of modern day Kumanovo, Skopje, Stip and Titov Veles, western Bulgaria and Romania, and west to northern Epirus. Most of the upper and lower Macedonia were taken over. Thus Phrygian influence was replaced by Illyrian."

(John Shea, Macedonia and Greece: the struggle to define a new Balkan nation, pp 46-7)

"The possibility of an Illyrian migration (although not at that time) had already been raised by some of Maspero's contemporaries, who supposed that the Dorians may have migrated -- in 1104 BC, traditionally -- because of pressures from the north. Maspero accepted such an explanation for the Dorian migration, placed it somewhat earlier than 1104, and concluded that during most of the second millennium the Dorians, Phrygians, and Libu had all inhabited the central Balkans. But ca. 1200 the three nations were driven out by the Illyrians: the Illyrian nation, having tardily left its Indo-European homeland in northern Europe, reached and appropriated the Balkans, sending the Phrygians southeast across the Dardanelles, the Dorians south into Greece, and the Libu westward on their interminable tour to Egypt."

(Robert Drews, The End of the Bronze Age: changes in warfare and the catastrophe ca. 1200 BC, p. 58)

"This is only certain, that within the Pelasgian country Thracian tribes appear. (...)it is nevertheless a fact: such also is the case of the invasion of the Thracians and Illyrians. The latter certainly belongs to a much later time than is generally believed; that the Homeric age, for example, does not know of it (...) in my opinion the invasion of the Illyrians belongs to a very late period, perhaps to the thirtieth or fortieth, if not the fiftieth Olympiad: it certainly did not happen much earlier."

(Barthold Georg Niebuhr, Marcus von Niebuhr, Lectures on Ancient History VOL 1: from the earliest times to the taking of Alexandria by Octavianus, p 211)


*THE GREEKS:

"Philology was also of some help in dating the arrival of the Greeks in Greece. In reconstructing the prehistory of the Greek dialects, Paul Kretschmer concluded that there had been three Greek invasions of Greece during the Bronze Age. The last of these, ca 1200 BC, was surely the Dorian Invasion. The two earlier invasions brought the Ionians and 'Achaeans' respectively ('Achaean' was supposed to be the linguistic ancestor of both the Aeolic and the Arcado-Cypriote dialects). Since several centuries must have separated each of these invasions the first of them must have occurred very early, perhaps as early as 2000 BC."

(Robert Drews, The Coming of the Greeks: Indo-European Conquests in the Aegean and the Near East, pp8-9)

*THE PELASGIANS:

"There is, however, good reason for regarding the Pelasgians as constituting the great bulk of the earliest inhabitants of Greece, and occupying the countries from Mount Olympus to Cape Taenarum, in Peloponnesus, with the exception of the central part of the countries, which was inhabited by the Hellenic race."

(Barthold Georg Niebuhr, Marcus von Niebuhr, Lectures on Ancient History VOL 1: from the earliest times to the taking of Alexandria by Octavianus, p 206)

Category:

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Tags:

• Ancient
• Greece
• Greek
• civilization
• Pelasgians
• Pelasgoi
• Illyrian
• Albanian
• propaganda
• Albania
• Shiptar
• Phrygians
• Brygians
• Thracians

[CristianoRonaldoRMFC]

THE OLDEST PEOPLE IN BALKANS ARE THE HELLENIC-PELASGIANS WHO DESCEND FROM ΤΗΕ PROTO-HELLENIC PELOPONNESIAN PELASGOS,IT'S A GREEK WORD,WHAT YOU CAN'T UNDERSTAND albanian monkeys;SO AUTOMATICALLY,THE DESCENDANTS OF THE GREEK-PELASGIANS LIKE ILLYRIANS,GREEKS,ETRUSCANS,PHI­LISTINES ETC ARE HELLENIC/GREEK TOO SO SHUT THE FUCK UP AND STOP TRYING TO STEAL OUR HISTORY LIKE THE monkeys of skopje DO!YOU SHOULD BE BETTER WITH US BECAUSE OF OUR COMMON ANCESTRY!

[bojan1647]

illyrians are from dalmacia in croatia ....albanians are refugees from small asia ,read that in national albanian libraries .......MACEDONIANS ARE THE OLDEST NATION IN THE BALKAN ......REPUBLIC OF MACEDONIA TIMELESS

[Ivanecat]

Bulgaria is the oldest country.FORZA BULGARIA.

[AZOR555555]

Albanians are not Illyrians!Illyrians and Thracians are Greeks!

[greecedrummer]

Albanians are Turks, Greeks, Gypsies, Roma, homeless people, Bulgarians, Pomaks and the devil knows what else. Illyrians have kinship with the Dalmatians and Croats then mixed with Epiroter Greeks. You have to learn history. Not to be confused with raki. Arwaniter are Greeks, Kastriotis was Greek.

[adhuruesi]

FUCK YOU troyans was illyrians stooped motherfucker,dardanians was illyrians asshole,epirotes was illyrians,paiones was illyrians,

[VonManavis]

Τ'αρχίδια μου είναι φυσικά τα αρχαιότερα! Άντε τελειώνετε, γιατί έκανε κάτι καταπληκτικές δηλώσεις η Μενεγάκη σήμερα!

[socrates6068]

@EndiLivinExtralarge yes and slavs of fyrom are macedonians the same as you are illirian....pfffff desperate losers

[EndiLivinExtralarge]

JEALOUS SON OF A SLAVIC BITCH ....WE ARE ILLYRIAN DEAL WITH IT BITCH

[brbljo]

@Bigthelegend1972 The first Albanian school opened in Korca in 1887.The first Albanian school in Kosova opened in Prizren in 1889.The first Albanian school for girls opened in Korce in 1891." by Serbian Dositej Obradovic...and dont use sign like = between you and Greeks shame on you idiots